Masquerading Marauders
by Marauder Fodder
Summary: When the Marauders find out that Hogwarts is throwing a Masquerade Ball on Halloween, James sees this as his chance to finally woo Lily. But will they all find dates in time? And manage to stay out of detention?


_A/N: *deep inhale* Ahhh... love that new fic smell. So this is a test chapter. If you like it, please let us know and by all means, chapter 2 will shortly follow. Just to clarify, the main plot is revealed farther in the chapter. However, I simply could not resist writing something that to my crazed mind served as an FU to J. K. Rowling. I'll never forgive her for book 7 *glowers*... but for now, on with the show! This does have some strong language, so please if you're a dandy, don't read it. And obviously, most of this stuff belongs to J. K. Rowling (that cow) and I'm not making any money off of it yadda yadda yadda disclaimer disclaimer. Ta-dah! Review!_

Once his eyes had glided over the last lines of text, he sighed. He added the last page to the utterly massive pile of parchment next to him and took off his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose in hopes of shooing away the headache forming between his eyes. He chanced a glance up to see his three friends staring at him from the edge of their seats on the lounge. All of them frozen in tense silence as they waited for his reaction.

"Well that certainly got out of hand didn't it?," James said, as he began to pace slowly in front of the fireplace.

As if a gun had gone off, they all started in a mad rush. All of them talking over each other. Remus held up his hand, and Sirius and Peter silenced. They glanced at each other trying to figure out how he was always able to do that as Remus turned back to James, "So what the bloody hell was that about? And why am I in it? How would she know about my 'furry little problem'? What are you telling people?"

"And why do I have to start out in Azkaban and wind up getting killed by a ruddy drapery? I refuse to ever be your children's godfather."

"And I would never sell you out to some evil wizard, James!"

At this, the other three paused and turned to look at Peter Pettigrew. He was shaking like he was about to wet himself. "W-what? Why are you looking at me like that?," he studdered.

"Let's just say, I'm on to you, Wormtail," Sirius stated.

"For fucks sake," Remus groaned. "Seriously, what the hell _is_ this? Let me see her note again."

James grudgingly held out a piece of parchment with a hastily scrawled note.

_Dear Loser (James),_

_I thought you liked me you said it yourself I hate you. Remember that time when you kissed me on a dare because of one of your stupid Maurader bets? WELL BURN FOR IT! _

_I'll be the first to admit that I got a bit carried away. It was supposed to be more like "James finally hooks up with Lily and then they DIE!" Then it evolved! Why ruin just YOU? I could ruin your friends! You're precious crush! Your future spawn! Haha!_

_Not only will I destroy you, but I will profit! I will profit like never before! Your story will make me billions! I will sell it to every newspaper and publishing company in this whole damned country!_

_Well bye you piece of shit I have more things to do than remember YOU._

_Sincerely, _

_Rita Skeeter_

_(Penname J.K. Rowling)_

"For the life of me, I can't figure out why she would even do this," Sirius took the note from Remus and read through it again. "If she's just trying to make us look bad, why did her story turn into everyone dies and James' son turns out to be the world's whiniest little bitch?"

James simply shrugged as he flopping into a chair and propped his feet up on the table. "At least there's no way that story could ever happen. Lily and I are going to have a girl when we get married." ("When she stops trying to curse you into oblivion whenever you look at her," Sirius mumbled.) "Rita's nuts. Make money, my arse. Only possible market for that shit is to the Muggle children. They'll buy anything. Ha!"

Remus gathered all the parchments up and tossed them in the fire. "I bet the cow was too dumb to make a copy anyway."

Peter hadn't moved from his spot on the lounge, still cradling a limp owl in his arms. Sirius stalked to Peter's side and snatched the sagging bundle of feathers. Prodding it again and again with his finger, he yelled, "See? Nothing. It hasn't fucking moved in 7 hours. It's dead. Get rid of it before we all fucking catch a disease!"

Peter tried desperately to regain ownership of the bundle. "Please! It's getting better! It'll heal! Give it back!"

"You know nothing of owls," barked Sirius.

Remus leaned in to inspect the damage. "I can't fathom why she tried to tie several thousand sheets of parchment to one leg of this owl. I can only imagine it had to drag itself upon departure. Couldn't even bloody fly. How could she possibly think that this was sane?" He glanced to the door only to hear muffled cries still coming from the hallway. "The Fat Lady is still out there flipping a shit."

"Who gives a damn about a painting, right now? There is a woman out there willing to write out my entire future and the future of my non-existant child on parchment _by hand_ and we're concerned about the ruddy dead owl?" James snapped. "For the love of god, just send Wormtail out there to wipe the droppings off of her and get it over with. There are bigger issues at hand!" He resumed his furious pacing, Rita's letter clutched in his right hand.

Wormtail sniffled obnoxiously in the corner, caressing the filthy owl corpse and it's partially attached leg. "Calm down, man. Are you really this torn up over a grimy owl?" spat out Sirius.

"Y-Y-...yes," choked out Peter.

"Fine. We'll give it a proper funeral and be done with it."

"You...you mean that?' Peter squeaked out through tears.

"Why the hell not?" Sirius shrugged, as he swiftly snatched the owl from Peter's filthy grasp and threw it promptly in the fire.

"There, you see? Like a proper Viking of some sort. He would have been proud to go so nobly."

Peter's eyes bulged out of his head. Once the shock wore off, he flung himself to his knees, threw his hands toward the ceiling, letting out a long "NOOOOOOOOOOO!"

"Shut up, Wormtail. It's over. On to more important things. If you bring the owl up again, you can join him, got it?" barked Sirus.

Peter chewed his lip as fresh tears streamed down his face. Putting his face in his hands, he scurried up the stairs to his dormitory. Downstairs, the guys listened for the usual tell-tale slamming of the door.

_BANG!_

"And, problem solved, I suppose," sighed Remus. He tossed his feet upon the ottoman, sending a few straggling pages and feathers flying through the air. "Now onto the problem at hand."

James spun around and met Remus's eyes. "Thank you!"

"I say we just ignore her," spouted Sirius. As he let his eyes linger on the smoldering remains of the disgusting bird in the fire, he pushed a stray hair out of his eyes. James was always telling him to get a damned hair cut before the Quidditch season started. Sirius didn't care. That was a whole month away. And besides, he had his eyes on that flying motorcycle for a while, and what kind of girl wants to ride bitch for a James Potter look-a-like anyway?

Sirius looked up to see James glaring him down almost as if he could read his thoughts. "What's wrong with ignoring her? How does that not immediately solve the problem?"

"Because, Sirius," quipped James, "she's clearly insane! She knows where my bed is...she knows where YOUR bed is! And what if Lily had read that? My chances would be ruined if she thought our kid would turn out like that."

Suddenly, the portrait swung open and in stumbled their roommate, Stephen. Stephen was the only 7th year Gryffindor who wasn't a Maurader. This owing mostly to the fact that he thought all of their ideas were rubbish and he was always in the greenhouses "tending" his plants. As per usual, the scent of the odd combination of bobutubers and smoke clung to him when he entered.

"H-hey guys...what the fuck is going on? The hallway's covered in bird shit and feathers. When I walked in, the Fat Lady was screaming in the far corner of her painting about "indecencies" or some shit that a "lady" shouldn't have to endure. Did you kill a fucking bird?" Stephen's words came out in a jumbled slur, as his glazed eyes swept across their faces.

"Dear god, Stephen! What is that smell? Did you try to smoke out of a plastic pipe again? I thought you would have learned your lesson after it burned through your bed sheets," Remus chided. From the expression on James and Sirius's faces, this was something that they had smelled many times before.

Stephen swayed on the spot as he pointed a finger at Remus, shouting "No, man...y-you need to calm down! I come in here to a bird sacrifice and you're pissed cause I smell like plastic? You need to get your priorities straight. I can't even begin to understa-..." his words cut short as his eyes locked on the skeleton in the fireplace. "Is that an owl in there? You fucking lit an owl on fire!"

"Forget the goddamned owl! Come read this," Sirius snatched the note from James' fist and passed it over to Stephen.

Stephen's eyes slowly glossed over the words on the page, widening as he read. "This bitch is _crazy_. James, what are you gonna do?"

"That's what we've been trying to figure out. You should have read the story. Literally, _thousands_ of pages of parchment. And in reality, I think I'm mentioned on less than ten. And it's just nonsense. As if I'd name my child Harry. I hate that name. I much prefer Balthazar..."

"Anyway," Remus interrupted. "We've got to act quickly, before this gets out of hand." No sooner had he said this, that an owl bumped the window. Sirius rushed to let it in and it dropped to the floor with a thud. The bird had a letter and a superfluous rock tied to its leg. Sirius quickly unweighted the poor creature only to discover the rock had absolutely no purpose.

James walked over to snatch up the scroll. As he unrolled it, he recognized the untidy scrawl.

_Dear Loser (James),_

_I'm actually going to be needing that manuscript back. So please remove this owl's weight and replace with the manuscript. Also, I'll be needing the weight back, so you may as well go ahead and put them both on._

_No funny business. I've weighed both the manuscript and the weight. I expect the owl by midnight...or else._

_Haha!_

_Rita_

"What the fuck does she think is going to happen?" Sirius tossed the weight from one hand to the other. "Does she think that without the weight, it's just going to go floating off?"

"Oh my god, I'm so sick of this slag!" Remus snatched the note and took it to a table in the corner where he hastily scribbled a response.

_Rita,_

_We burned your manuscript. We're keeping your rock. The first owl is dead. Go fuck yourself._

_Remus_

He tied it to the owl and tossed the bird straight out the window. Dusting his hands against the side of his pants, he went and rejoined the group by the fire.

"There. Done. Was that so hard?"

"No need to get so tiffy, Moony," James smirked at the young werewolf. "That time of the month?"

Across the common room, Stephen suddenly jolted away from what he was looking at. "Guys! Rita is the least of your problems right now. Oh, fuck, we're screwed," he clapped his hands over his mouth.

James and Sirius ran to see what their mate was gaping at. Remus joined them shortly after and peered over their shoulders. All four boys stood staring at a note tacked to the message board on the wall.

_**Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry**_

**is proud to announce**

**that on Halloween night**

**at 8:00 PM**

**we will be holding**

**A MASQUERADE BALL**

**Come dressed in your best costume**

**There will be an award for the**

**best and most original costume**

**and a special performance by**

**LADY GAGA  
**

"Oh no," all of the color drained from Sirius' face.

"Come on, man," Remus said. "It's just a ball. What's the big deal?"

"It's a bloody DANCE! I don't dance..."

James, however, looked like Christmas had come early. "Lily won't hex me like usual if she can't see who's asking her to dance! I'm going to start brainstorming costume ideas right now!" And he practically sprinted up the stairs to his dorm.

Had the boys been looking out the window instead of after their nutter friend, James, they would have seen an owl lazily floating by.

_A/N: Soooo... what did you think? Did you love it? Hate it? Please review... *sad pitiful eyes* (And we are gaga for Gaga. She is so a witch. How the muggles haven't caught on yet is beyond me *wink* So I just couldn't resist pointing out that she's been popular in the wizarding world for 200 years before we even heard of her lawls) Loves and hugs!_


End file.
